Schwinger, Back from Atom Parley, Wonders if Soviet Bomb Is Complete

Russia may know how to make an atom bomb, but she still may not know how to control it, Professor of Physics Julian S. Schwinger noted yesterday on his return from over a month's stay in Europe, where he attended the world's first international conference on nuclear physics.

"We certainly have good evidence of a Soviet atomic explosion," Professor Schwinger said. "But," he added, "it's one thing for the Russians to create an explosion at a certain place, and it's another thing indeed for the Russians to package an atomic bomb and explode it any time they want to."

The Soviets never had any fundamental secret to overcome, Schwinger remarked. "It was just a matter of getting enough technology together. What the Russians had to do is evident--they had to get enough fissionable material together and then lick the detonating problem.' This is apparently what they have done, he said.

American Delegate

During his stay in Europe, Professor Schwinger served as an American delegate to the atomic conference at Basel, Switzerland, and was one of ten physicists presenting papers to the parley. Professor Schwinger's paper reviewed work in the new field of electrodynamics.

If there was one thing evident at the conference, Schwinger remarked, it was the fact that America's nuclear physics is "undoubtedly ahead to the rest of the world's."